The fate of trees in Victoria’s main square will be known today when the Environment and Planning Review Tribunal meets to hear an appeal filed by the local council, which wants the trees uprooted.

The council is claiming that the trees’ roots at Victoria’s Pjazza Indipendenza, known as it-Tokk, are causing harm to the archaeological remains underneath the square and damaging surrounding houses, nine metres away.

More than 100 people last month signed a petition calling on Gozo Minister Anton Refalo and shadow minister Chris Said to help stop the embellishment works.

The trees are more than half a century old.

Experts believe uprooting the trees will cause more damage to the archaeological remains at Victoria’s Pjazza Indipendenza, top, known as it-Tokk. However Victoria local council wants to uproot the trees and replace them with shrubs in planters.

Environment NGO Flimkien Għall-Ambjent Aħjar (FAA) is against the removal of the trees and instituted a prohibitory injunction against Mepa, which confirmed it had no intention to allow the uprooting of the trees. FAA submitted two reports to the tribunal, both stating that uprooting risked causing more damage to the archaeological remains. The reports were drawn up by archaeologist Reuben Grima and former assistant director of Mepa’s environment protection directorate Alfred Baldacchino.

“The weight of the evidence suggests that the uprooting of the trees may well cause more damage to the archaeological deposits than leaving them in situ,” Dr Grima said in his report.

He suggested using the precautionary principle and said keeping the trees would be better than removing them.

In his report, Mr Baldacchino agreed that removing the trees could cause more harm than good and pointed out that the trees provided ecological, aesthetic and health benefits.

The local council’s plans, Mr Baldacchino said, would also go against the government’s electoral manifesto which had promised to safeguard existing trees and to incentivise the planting of more trees, especially indigenous ones.

A permit granted by Mepa in 2013 for embellishment works on the square in the Urban Conservation Area only permitted sensitive pruning of the protected trees. Despite the Mepa ruling, the council started to implement its plans to uproot the trees at It-Tokk last year, claiming it was appealing this condition.

The council had said it would be replanting the trees elsewhere but the trees’ survival remains at risk as the works already carried out severely damaged the trees.